Fear is a Four Letter Word
by Victoria LeRoux
Summary: Normally mutants weren't much of a problem for them. Of course, normally Clint, Steve, and Tony weren't tied to trees and having their worst memories come to light. Oneshot.


**Fear is a Four Letter Word**

Summary: Normally mutants weren't much of a problem for them. Of course, normally Clint, Steve, and Tony weren't tied to trees and having their worst memories come to light.  
Characters: Clint, Tony, and Steve. But really, it's a Clint and Tony story (not a big surprise, I know)  
Category: Whump, angst like WHOA  
Rated: T for references to child abuse, cursing, the usual  
**Trigger Warning**: Brief mention of self-harm

* * *

Normally, mutants weren't much of a problem for them.

It was usually some guy or gal, with some weird telekinesis or electrokinesis or sonickinesis or pyrokinesis, and so on and so forth.

Occasionally they did match up against someone with a truly, utterly, weird mutation. And it never went well.

Like this guy, for instance. He had impersonated a SHIELD agent, picking them up after they were tired from a really, long, hard mission. Iron Man didn't have enough power to fly back, Steve's entire body was throbbing from exhaustion, and Clint's fingers were bloody from overuse and loss of his finger glove, despite years of calluses. While Natasha, Bruce and Thor took the other one; Tony, Clint, and Steve had collapsed from exhaustion in their own quinjet.

And then collapsed for real when sleeping gas filled the jet.

Which was why they now found themselves tied to some trees in the middle of who the fuck knows where, with a creepy mutant leering over them.

"Cops killed my family," he explained, patiently. "You see, I'm from a small town. When it became common knowledge I was a mutie, well..." he shrugged. "They made a raid on my house. My family didn't live." He leaned down, gripping Steve's chin in his hands. "Hmm..." he closed his eyes, smiling. "Poor Captain America...you're sad cause your family didn't live either. The little one you had." He let go, patting Steve's face. The other man scowled back. "War can be so hard...leaves you...broken. Unsure of yourself. Useless," he hissed.

Clint glared at him. The guy was some sort of empath or memory reader. Cap was trying to hide the pain his words had caused. Steve didn't talk about the war much. Not to them, anyway. "Please," Clint sneered. "Everyone knows he was in a war. That's nothing new. What do you want?"

The mutant turned his attention on him and Tony. There was a strange spark in his eyes and his stance altered from a casual one to an aggressive one, and then took on a familiar slouch.

"Hello, Tweetie Bird," he leered at Clint. The archer grimaced, trying to avoid meeting his gaze. It worked, at first anyway. Words were like water – Clint let them wash over him, and then pushed them away. "You lost your family too, didn't you?"

The archer couldn't resist flinching as cold fingers grasped his chin and yanked up his head. He locked his jaw, closing his eyes. If his suspicion was correct, the guy required eye contact to do much of anything.

"You're not much fun, are you?" the mutant sounded slightly put out as his fingers dug into Clint's skin. His voice was a soft croon in Clint's ear, but he had no doubt that it carried to the other two. "I can go play with Tone Tone over here, if you prefer. I'm sure his pain would be more palatable."

The jibe worked. Clint snapped his eyes open to glare at the mutant, but his fury slipped as he encountered a sensation not unlike finding a trapdoor open under his feet.

"What?" he hissed. He could feel images pressing to the forefront of his mind, tugging at his mind and demanding that they be given his attention. He struggled, trying to push it away, but his resistance was fleeting. It snapped easily.

_The sharp tang of blood, stronger than he'd ever encountered before. His mentor stood over him, hand on Clint's shoulder. "Good job," he said. "Your first kill…_

Other memories swarmed him, mostly a horde of brief impressions and sensations. Flashes of bloody faces, endless accusations, and the realization that he'd shot his own brother. With every memory, he could hear the mutant speaking in a constant tone that tried to sound sympathetic but only sounded gleeful.

"You've had a hard time of it, haven't you?" the guy hissed. Each word the mutant spoke pulled up feelings he was familiar with: regret, self-loathing, guilt, hatred. They pulsated through his body, not letting him go. "I always liked watching the carnies when they were in town. They always looked so happy and free. Daddy and big brother didn't love you enough, did they? It's okay, I understand. Caring for others… it's so _hard_. It's painful, knowing that you'll be the death of them someday. Poor little songbird. You were always a puppet."

It was then that Clint felt a blind, consuming rage wash over him. He had seen brief flashes of the mutant's own pain mingled with his own feelings of failure and suddenly he wanted to hurt him. He wanted to hurt him more than he had hurt anyone before. "You'd know about that, wouldn't you?" he growled. "_Your_father certainly didn't seem to think you were anything other than his little-"

The mutant tangled his fingers in Clint's hair and slammed his head back into the tree, pushing with the heel of his hand so that Clint could feel splinters digging into his neck. "Shut up," the man screeched, spittle landing on Clint's cheeks. "_Shut up._You don't know a thing about my father."

Clint couldn't help but smile, despite the fact that he could feel blood running down his back from the scratches in his neck. He'd suffered worse pain, just like the mutie in front of him. If the mutie wanted to use that against him, he didn't mind. It would protect the others. "My father at least was honest about his feelings," he admitted coldly. "But he told me I was a failure. I didn't have to look for his feelings or try to beg for his attention." He could see Tony visibly jerk out of the corner of his eye, but didn't dare turn his head. "But I bet you pleaded with him, tried to show him what a wonderful little genius you were. Bet he didn't care. Bet he didn't even turn his attention from his work or his television or from whatever shiny object had his attention."

The words were easy enough to say, brought about by years of being around Natasha. She had a gift for pulling at other's emotions, for twisting the truth until they believed it was unmistakably real. The brief flash he'd gleamed from the mutant were slight enough that he could only guess.

But he'd hit a nerve. He realized that as the mutant smashed a fist into his face. Clint tried to lash out against him, sinking his teeth in the guy's hand when the mutant went for a stranglehold.

The second he punctured skin, it was like a dam had been shattered. Memories assaulted Clint's mind, his and the mutant's, mingling into a haze of pain that he couldn't escape or ignore.

_His arms ached from hanging from the ceiling. The open, bleeding wounds where his fingernails used to be were excruciating. They'd slowly yanked free seven, one for each of the men he'd injured in his last attempt to escape. It had been that attempt that had let him know that no one was coming for him. Not this time, at least. He'd gone in knowing that he was meant to be captured. The first two weeks he'd been overwhelmingly confident in the knowledge that SHIELD would come for him._

_Coulson and Romanov wouldn't leave him behind. They'd outlined the simple plan – go in, get captured, drop some red herrings and be out within a week._

_A week had turned into two, and two weeks had turned into a month. If his count was right, he was coming up on fifty-six days of captivity. At this point, he wasn't even sure why they hadn't killed him yet. He was certainly enough of a pain in his captors' ass that they had every right to eliminate him._

_Maybe Fury had called off the operation. The Director had certainly made it clear that he wasn't fond of a smartass, cocky archer who didn't have the decency to use normal weapons. He'd hired Clint for his skills and there was no lost love between them. With Clint's luck, Fury didn't think he was valuable enough to break free. At this point, the most Clint could hope for was Natasha giving the finger to the American government and deciding it was worth her time to haul him out before she went back to being a assassin/spy/secret-stealing freak/woman with crazy ninja skills or whatever she'd been before she'd been set as his target._

_Sweat mingled with blood, running down his back as he heard a door slam. Wonderful. It looked like it was time for another round of beatings and demands to give up every secret he knew. The door opened and Clint heard the by-now familiar swish of a whip. He should have guessed. They weren't at all original. They'd swipe at him until he was unconscious, then wake him up with a dousing of antiseptic thrown across his wounds._

_Clint wondered why he still bothered to keep fighting them. It would probably save them all a great deal of pain and time if he just strangled himself on his chains._

* * *

Tony watched his friend jerk against his bonds and tried to ignore the whine coming out of Clint's throat.

"Leave him alone," he demanded in a cold voice, trying not to think about the repercussions of catching the mutant's attention. At first, he had been content to remain half-dazed and silent, but now that he was aware, enough was _enough_. He knew the others wouldn't have blamed him for remaining silent and letting them deflect the attention – he was the civilian, the untrained one after all – but they were his _allies_, damn it. They were the people who Pepper had jokingly called his 'friends' without realizing how right she really was.

"Or what, Mr. Stark?" the mutant turned with a wide grin across his face. When Clint made a strangled sounding hiss that must have been his attempt to repress a yell of pain, the grin only grew wider.

The sick bastard was enjoying this.

"You have a few options," Steve interrupted. Tony glared at him, as he knew perfectly well what the soldier was trying to do. "You can surrender to us and face incarceration, possibly with a reduced sentence. You can attempt to flee and use the time to get a head start on SHIELD. You could also keep doing exactly what you're doing and ensure that you will die in prison."

Tony tried to muffle his snort. As far as negotiations went, Steve was doing a pretty pathetic job of convincing the mutie to release them. It didn't matter, not much anyway. In six hours, SHIELD would find them. The fact that Fury had required all his agents to be injected with a GPS chip after the Loki fiasco made certain of it. It would take two hours for the agency to realize they were missing, one for them to argue about which enemy kidnapped them this time and another half-hour for them to mobilize a team. There would be at least two and a half hours of travel before they reached their location.

"SHEILD doesn't have prisons," Tony pointed out. "Just hell holes where they stick their enemies."

The mutant began to head toward Tony, probably interested in trying out his new toy. Tony's breaths were coming more raggedly now, but he didn't bother to acknowledge it. Instead, his eyes were on Clint, who had just begun to open his eyes. An icy feeling washed over Tony's body as he noticed the faint trace of fear on Clint's face.

"So why are you doing this?" Tony asked, actually curious. "It can't be because I'm rich, because you wouldn't have bothered with them." He wasn't sure if the mutant knew Steve or Clint's names, and if he didn't, he preferred to keep it that way. "They're as poor as dirt, being underlings and all. You obviously don't want to piss off SHIELD, because to them, we're disposable. Maybe you want to make a name for yourself?" The mutant was coming closer, and Tony did his best to keep talking. The more he talked, the more distracted the mutant (hopefully) grew, which equaled more recovery time and pain avoidance.

"Something like that, Mr. Stark," the mutant said slowly. His gait was similar to a prowling cat's. He almost radiated pure malice and smug certainty. "You can call this my job application."

_That_was enough to stump Tony and make him form a syllable he hadn't since he was five. "Huh?" He recovered quickly despite his bewilderment, and fired off, "What, to Villains-R-Us? They aren't accepting applications in the half-assed scheme department, the last I heard."

Admittedly not his most creative taunt, but he was under pressure.

A flicker of confusion crossed the mutant's face and he cocked his head to one side. "No. To SHIELD."

There was a long, drawn out silence.

"Your application to SHIELD," he repeated flatly.

"Of course. They like powerful, strong, intelligent employees. I'm all of them. I can fight. I can extract secrets and lead interrogations. I managed to capture you three. I'm good at following orders-"

"I'm sure your father made sure of that," Clint snarked from across the clearing. The mutant, whose eyes had been on Tony, went completely still and started to turn back toward Clint.

"SHIELD doesn't hire sadists or murderers," Steve broke in hastily.

There was a look of actual _confusion_on the man's face. "He's a murderer," he said, pointing to Clint. "So is he," he pointed to Tony, who winced. He wondered if it was a lucky guess or if he didn't actually need contact to do his little mutanty thing.

Steve looked confused, but Tony just felt _pissed._

"So you think being a demented sociopath is enough to get you the job? There's a few more requirements than that. You might make a good henchmen, but I haven't seen anything that would make SHIELD look at you any longer than it took for them to shoot you," at Tony's words, the mutant wavered, but Tony could still see that he was livid at Clint's jibe from earlier. He had to push harder, to dig deeper. "Maybe insanity runs in the family. No wonder they killed off your precious little relatives."

The man strode over to Tony, locking eyes with him. Tony did his best of keep a cocky smirk on his face despite the fact that there was a thrill of fear running through his veins. He knew it was a bad idea to get involved in a team. It was only going to bring him pain.

There was a long silence between the two of them as the mutant's gaze turned searching. Tony wondered what he was looking for – wondered what he would _find_. Maybe it would be the memories of his father that Clint's words had dug up. Maybe it would be memories of the cave. Or his mother's death. Or Obie –

His antagonist's eyes suddenly narrowed and he raised a hand, lightly resting his fingers on Tony's arc reactor.

"Perhaps Obie should have made sure you would never leave that cave," he mused quietly, his voice soft enough that Tony knew he was the only one who heard.

It felt as if he'd been sucker-punched. The ever-lurking feeling of raw betrayal rose up within him. Usually it would be tempered with bloodthirst and the desire for vengeance, but this time it was pure and unmoderated.

The mutant kept his voice as a soft croon, words dripping from his lips like poison. "They're going to abandon you one day. Barton? He's a spy. He doesn't care for anyone but himself. If he gets the order, he'll stab you in the back without a second thought. Rogers? He's just using you until he's used to this new time frame. All he wishes is to have Howard Stark back, and you're a temporary replacement."

A year ago, Tony might have believed him. A year ago he hadn't been forced to watch Barton choke down maggots in an effort to protect his team and he hadn't allowed himself to be tortured for them. He hadn't gotten drunk with Romanov or slept on the rooftop after disastrous missions. A year ago, Tony wouldn't have been able to ignore the nagging little voice in his head that said he was right, because a year ago was when Steve still would accidentally call him Howard when distracted.

Maybe that's why Tony said what he did next. Maybe that's why he felt so overwhelmingly confident in his team's ability that he didn't mind getting tortured for them, because he had no doubt that's what was going to come next. "I guess you know about that, right? You're used to being replaced and tossed aside like _trash_."

The mutant's hand clenched around the arc reactor, and for a moment Tony was afraid he was going to pull it out. Later, he'd look back and wish that he did.

"You want me to show Barton what you've done?" the mutant asked softly. "I can do that. I can show you begging for mercy as you grovel on the floor. I can show how stupid you were and that your father didn't care about you. I can show Rogers too. Make a party out of it. It's just what you've always wanted, isn't it? For people to know the _truth _about how disgusting you are?"

Well, shit. That wasn't exactly what Tony was aiming for.

"I bet you were expecting pain, weren't you?" the man hissed. There was a crazed light in his eyes. "I bet you thought you'd get off as easy as they did. You're used to ignoring everything that's happened to you. You're not like poor ickle Rogers, who misses the past every day. You're not like Tweetie Bird either, who doesn't give a shit about how he feels because he's had it beaten out of him. No, what you're afraid of most is them finding out. Of them finding out how fucked-up you are."

Tony opened his mouth to speak, but couldn't find anything to say. The mutant was backing away from him, looking triumphant as he turned back toward Steve. His voice had risen throughout his rant, and Tony was sure Clint and Steve had heard almost every word of his speech.

His breath came out in a hiss. No. this wasn't what he'd been aiming for at all.

Tony watched, still feeling decidedly off-balance by the mutant's words. But _no._ No. He couldn't let the mutant reveal everything he'd tried to hide. Yes, his team accepted the person they _thought_ he was, but when they knew what he'd done? It didn't matter to him that Clint and Natasha were assassins. It was their _job._Clint's jeering taunts from earlier came to mind - if he knew, they'd think he was pathetic. They all would.

Tony jerked against his bonds, trying to ignore the sharp pain as they dug into his wrists. It took just a few moments of frantic struggling before they cut into his skin. The mutant watched him, a smug smile on his face as he dared Tony to try to stop him. Cocky bastard. Tony would enjoy wiping off his smile.

How long before SHIELD came? He wondered frantically as he struggled. They had to have been missing for hours by now. The mutant had waited patiently for them to wake up, and the gas had hit them hard. Clint had woken up at least an hour after Tony and Steve had looked more bored than Tony had ever seen him look before by the time he woke up. Tony continued to thrash, not realizing he was cursing at the mutant as he ignored the white-hot pain.

Steve was looking at him as if he had lost his mind. Clint's expression was hard to decipher, with the smashed nose and all. Tony could see Clint wiggling slightly against his own tree, probably attempting to get free. Steve... Tony wasn't sure what Steve was doing but he hoped it was something useful.

"You want me to show them?" the mutant asked cheerfully. "Think of it... they'll know everything. I haven't tried it so completely before. Maybe their minds will shatter. They might forget who they are and become you. It'll be fun."

Tony yanked one last time, but his bonds were unbreakable. With a snarl, he tugged against them. Maybe it had been six hours. Maybe SHIELD would burst into sight any moment now and stop him.

* * *

Steve could tell from the look on Tony's face that whatever was about to happen, he probably wasn't going to like it. Slowly he began to work against the bindings, testing them with his strength. He doubted the mutant had been able to properly estimate his strength - Steve had never precisely measured it himself.

His fingers flew across the knots and found them too tight. Brute strength it was. Steve began to weaken them, yanking his hands apart as subtly as he could before snapping them back together and repeating the entire process again. The threads felt significantly weaker when he tried it again. Not good enough. He respected his teammate's privacy, and he wanted to spare Tony the pain both Steve and Clint had gone through.

It was like being pulled apart and jolted out of reality. Old wounds reopened so they felt as fresh as if they had just happened yesterday. The fading ache of Bucky's fall had just begun to fade, and then it was torn back open.

If he could spare his team from that, he would do his best.

The mutant was taunting Tony, his voice cold and full of mirth. It angered Steve, that one man could bring so much pain upon his new family.

He yanked again, felt a few more pieces of the bond give. A few more tries, and he'd be free. He could stop this.

Steve pushed away his own pain and gave Tony a look he hoped the genius would understand. From the look on Tony's face, he misinterpreted the silent support entirely. Steve refocused his efforts, channeling all of his strength into breaking free. He wasn't sure what they had been bound with, but whatever it was happened to be strong.

He yanked again, and slipped a few inches as his hands suddenly broke free. Quickly he reached around, tearing at the rope wrapped around his sternum.

From the side, Clint gave a gasp and Steve knew he had precious seconds left.

He pulled with a snarl, attracting the mutant's attention. _There._He broke free and fell to the ground, barely catching himself from landing face first in the dirt.

He scrambled to his feet, and the mutant's powers hit him with the strength of a bulldozer... no, an entire building falling onto his head.

Steve was caught by an overwhelming display of images and emotions, that settled into glimpses of what must have been a very young Tony.

_A small child, just wanting attention-_

_-nights in a freezing cave, wondering if this one will be his last-_

_-a face that spoke of friendship and family turning into one he should loathe-_

_"-odey, what are you-"_

-"Tony, I just can't do this any-"

Steve struggled free, tried to get to his feet. The array of images, out of order and full of emotion he didn't think Tony was capable of feeling, disoriented him. He felt like he was five for one moment, then he was twenty. One moment he was at a college graduation his father didn't bother attending, and the next he was nearly being killed with a weapon that had his name on it.

He was Tony Stark one moment and Steve Rogers the next.

Steve was sure that he was being shown more than he would have been capable of remembering had he not been enhanced. Sometimes brief images would whip by and he would barely have time to recognize them before he was being flung into the next one.

It had been six hours, thirty nine minutes since he had woken up. _Where was SHIELD?_

Shakily he climbed to his feet, pushing away the memories assaulting him so that he could focus on the task at hand. Eliminate the threat. That's all he needed to do. Eliminate the threat.

Every time he took a step, a new emotion and memory would push him down. He could hear someone cursing from near him - Clint or Tony, he wasn't sure.

It was like trying to move a mountain by himself. Exhaustion plagued him, forced him down.

One knee hit the ground.

The other knee hit the ground.

He fell, bracing himself on his hands.

_"Stark doesn't want to play? It won't hurt much."_

There was a thud, and Steve barely had the strength to turn his head and see what had caused it. He felt as if there was an enormous weight on his shoulders and every movement was like struggling through syrup. Clint had somehow gotten free and he was beginning to push himself up. The archer picked up a branch and lunged at the mutant, who whirled in surprise.

* * *

"Come on, come on," Tony grunted as he tried to jerk free. His fingers brushed against the knots as he tried to pull free. He used to do it all the time when the other children would tie him up because they thought he was too arrogant to play with them. Back then, he was able to undo any knot in a couple of seconds. His fingers yanked at pulled at the knots, hoping they weren't too intricate.

At last he found a loose strand that he could tug, and it came loose. Quickly he pulled at it, slipping his hands out and moving to the bonds near his ankles. They were easier to pull free, either because of his desperation or because the mutant hadn't expected him to get his hands free.

He could tell that neither Steve nor Clint would be able to reach him. Not now that the man was concentrating the full extent of his powers on both of them. It would be up to him to eliminate the threat. He'd have to cross a line he hadn't deliberately chosen to cross in the past. Help wasn't on the way. It would be too late.

Tony dropped lightly to the ground in a daze, eyes narrowed as he watched Clint get kicked to the ground. Steve wasn't in any better shape than Barton, even if he looked physically better. Both of them looked defeated.

When the mutant returned his attention to Steve, completely ignoring Tony for the time being, Tony moved around his back to grab the stick Barton had dropped. Flecks of his friend's blood was smeared across it, making Tony assume that he'd used it to cut himself free. But that didn't matter. Not right now. Tony seized the stick and moved forward. At the last moment before he lunged, the mutant began to turn.

There was the familiar sensation of building pressure that made him think the mutant was about to try to attack him. No. This was his last chance. He had to take care of him.

Tony slammed forward with the stick, feeling it catch on a bone before it slid into the man's body. The mutant fell with a gurgle and the pressure vanished. Tony released the stick instantly, staggering away as he felt nausea wash over his body.

After he was done throwing up, he turned back. The mutant was flailing around on the ground and he turned away again. For some reason, the sight affected him in ways other visions hadn't. Maybe it was because he was the one that directly caused the injury. Maybe it was because he'd felt the sensation in his hands, unlike when he just blasted an enemy from a distance. He wondered if this was how Clint felt with his first kill.

Then the mutant's power was back, tearing at his mind with a force even stronger than before. It was probably a survival instinct - to attack his aggressors with full force when injured and drive them away, despite the fact that it would only weaken him. Tony let out a hiss of air as he staggered and almost fell into his own vomit. The bastard wouldn't die, would he?

_A hand struck out at him, slamming into his shoulder and sending him flying at the table. He hit it with a thud, gasping for breath as he slid to the ground._

The familiar form of his older brother was suddenly between him and his attacker. He could heard his brother speaking, but the words didn't register with his ringing ears.

He wondered if this was the way it would always be. His brother, between him and the world.

"What the hell?" he muttered quietly, then the realization hit him. _Clint._Barton had said in the past that he had an older brother. Shit. If Tony had seen something so personal from Clint's past, what had Barton seen from his?

_"I can do this all day."_

* * *

The mutant was coughing, blood hitting the ground as he let off another surge of power. Clint let the memories overwhelm him, then he pushed them away. He had done it for years, he could do it now. Even if the memories weren't his own, it was the same process.

Tony had distracted the mutant enough that Clint could bring himself up into a crouch. He had no weapons, not after Tony had seized the stick from him and stabbed the mutant with it. But Clint didn't need weapons. They just made things easier.

He couldn't made it to his feet, but that didn't matter. He didn't need to stand to deliver the final blow. He'd completed kills in worse shape than this before. Slowly Clint inched over to where the mutant thrashed weakly on the ground. His eyes were wide and terrified as he gasped out denials of his mortality.

_Snap._One sharp blow, and the mutant never would move again.

At the same time as his blow, there was the sharp sound of a gunshot. Clint struggled to his feet as Natasha entered the clearing, looking incredibly put-out that she had been forced to come fetch them.

"Honestly," she told him disdainfully, taking in the sight of the exhausted team. "I'm not sure what I missed, but he hardly counted as a moving target."

Clint gave a wheezing laugh and she moved forward to catch him, keeping him upright as Steve stood to go near Tony. If Clint had been a little less alert, he might not have noticed the wide-eyed look Tony sent his way.

"Damn it," he muttered, his face stinging. Nat gave him an inquisitive look, but he ignored her. Wide-eyed looks were never good.

The events of the day and capture caught up with him, and he stumbled slightly. Nat's grip tightened on his arm and he gave her a grateful look. He'd worry about whatever was eating up Tony later. Right now, all he wanted to do was sleep.

* * *

Tony was a remarkably hard man to track down, despite the fact that they lived within the same tower.

It took Clint three days to corner Tony with a bottle of vodka, and the only reason he was able to do so was because Steve had manhandled him first. By the time the archer found the pair upstairs, Steve had nineteen shot glasses in front of him and Tony looked to be drunk.

Clint dropped the bottle in front of Tony before pouring himself a drink. He took a swig from the glass in front of Tony - gin. It burned down his throat, bitter and sweet at the same time. He didn't take a second sip, but instead downed a large gulp of vodka. God, he loved vodka.

"So, daddy issues," he said conversationally. Steve, completely sober despite the fact that he'd obviously had a copious amount of alcohol raised an eyebrow but didn't interfere.

"What 'bout it?" Tony mumbled, sounding annoyed.

"Want to talk about it?" Clint wasn't exactly sure how to breach the awkward feeling that had been building between the three of them since their capture. He didn't blame Tony in the slightest for feeling uncomfortable about it, but he wanted to reassure him that his opinion of Tony hadn't changed. He had a feeling that if the tension was allowed to build for one more day, Tony would bolt for the hills.

"Not really. Saw most of yours," Tony's words were slurred as he spoke. The admission surprised Clint, and for a moment he was riveted in surprise. He wondered what Tony had seen. There wasn't much that was too horrible - sure, he got knocked around a lot, but he had his brother for company then.

"Kinda dull, really."

"Don't know what's worse. Yours hit you, mine didn't realize I existed. Graduated MIT at sixteen. Still wasn't enough to catch his attention," Tony was a brutally honest drunk, if nothing else. Clint felt guilty for using alcohol to open him up, but not guilty enough to stop.

He poured Tony another shot and handed it to him. The inventor downed it all in one gulp and took the bottle from Clint.

"How much has he had?" Clint asked cautiously, his words directed at Steve.

"A bottle or two," Tony said. "Think I'm out of vodka... glad you brought some more up."

The sharpshooter let out a low whistle, raising an eyebrow at Steve, who nodded in confirmation.

"He already talked a little to me," Steve admitted. "I should leave you two alone." The man pushed away from the table and gave a little wave. "Don't burn the tower down."

Tony gave a chuckle, but Clint ignored him.

"You think he's going to be fine?" he asked cautiously, ignoring Tony's expression.

Steve shrugged. "Just talk to him," he advised, then the door swung shut behind him and he was gone.

For the first time since before their capture, Clint was alone with Tony. It might have been a drunk Tony, but it was still him.

Clint's brilliant plan at working through their problems with several gallons of alcohol was stymied by the fact that Steve had already tried.

"So. Your dad didn't notice you and mine wished I was dead. We're fucked up, aren't we?" Clint asked, taking another long gulp of vodka. It had been a while since he'd tried to get properly drunk. Last time had been in Singapore with Nat, when she'd kept throwing glass after glass down his throat in an effort to induce alcohol poisoning and memory loss.

"Just a li'le," Tony admitted. "Fucking mutants. What have we ever done to them?"

Clint laughed. If only Tony knew. There was a whole vault of information on the topic.

"Did I kill him?" the genius asked suddenly, changing topics without missing a beat.

"No," Clint said instantly. "I finished him off. Your blow might have killed him, given time."

"Wish I did," Tony told him, sounding honest. "Hate myself for it, of course."

"I don't. He deserved to die." He'd gone after Clint's team. For that, death was a given.

"Still hate myself. He was my first, you know?"

Clint chuckled in an effort to diffuse the situation. It didn't work. "Too much information," he muttered, but Tony's face didn't lighten. The marksman sighed. "You've killed before."

"Never at hand to hand. I've stabbed people, but they haven't died from it. I've shot them, but it's different."

Clint knew the feeling of knife sliding through bone, of desperation causing someone to reach past the limits they thought they'd never go over. "Yeah, it is." He took another sip of vodka, suddenly not enjoying the taste as much.

"How do you get over it?"

"You don't. You just know that it was you or them, and move on with your life," a lie, because it wasn't always that simple. For a moment, he thought Tony would call him on it, but the genius only shrugged and took another gulp of whatever he was drinking.

"Wish it would hurry up. You and Natasha don't seem to care." The statement, while not maliciously meant, still hurt Clint. He flinched unconsciously and resisted the urge to pull away.

"Do we?" Clint mused, trying to sound thoughtful. He wondered if they really projected that image to the team. He considered, tilting his head to one side. Yes, he supposed. To the others, he and Nat probably looked cold and unfeeling. They certainly attempted not to grieve over the men and women they had executed over the years, but they each had kept their own tallies.

Clint stood unsteadily from the table and crouched near Tony, waiting until his friend met his eyes. The agent turned his neck slightly and tugged his collar to the side. Tony let out a harsh intake of breath, but didn't say anything. Clint knew his freshest wound was at the top this time.

"One scar," he told Tony quietly. "One scar for every man I've killed." Clint didn't know how many there were, not anymore. Last time, he had lost count as Natasha etched in cut after cut, men he'd killed under the influence of Loki. Feeling Tony's eyes riveted on the small slash peeking out from under the collar, Clint awkwardly adjusted the collar again and went back to his seat.

"All of us go on in different ways," he spoke quietly. "What matters is that you do. You can't dwell on this for the rest of your life. I don't care if it's drinking yourself into oblivion after each battle or volunteering for charity. Right now? Every time you close your eyes, you're thinking about him, aren't you? About how much you hated him, and how much you think he deserved to die for what he did to you?" Tony nodded, but Clint had already know it was true. "And the hate makes it worse," Clint finished. "Hate makes it harder to move on and know you did what you had to do."

"There had to have been another way," Tony said quietly.

Clint considered, weighing over what their options had been. He held up one finger. "Wait for rescue," he said softly. "Stay there, and listen to him fucking tell us about all our dirty secrets. Wait for the cavalry - hell, Natasha would have been there soon, and let him get captured. Or maybe he wouldn't have been captured. Maybe Natasha would have shot him. Option two," he help up a second finger. "We restrain him. Bring him in for questioning. Then what? Listen to him tell his interrogators exactly what they don't want to hear. Listen to him torture everyone near him. Or we could do what we did to Loki. Muzzle him, ship him off for a trial and execution. Or better yet, experimentation. SHIELD always likes having a mutant in the science labs."

Tony's face was getting paler.

"He wanted to die," Clint said softly. "He wanted for us to kill him, because he was going mad. He probably had a horde of voices in his head, telling him everything horrible about everyone near him. If he didn't want to die, he wouldn't have attacked us. Everyone with half a brain knows what happens to mutants in the governments."

Tony shrugged, but Clint could see him thinking his words over. "You didn't kill him," Clint added softly. "_I_did. I chose to kill him."

"So did I. You were just better at it."

"That's a fucking lousy excuse," Clint said in exasperation. "If you wanted him dead, he would have been dead."

"You can't know-"

"Yes, I can." Clint tapped his head. "Just like you know Loki once told me almost exactly that about Fury."

There was silence. A long, flat silence that stretched for so long Clint wondered if he had done irreparable damage. He could see Tony tensing, drawing into himself, and the archer wasn't sure how to stop him from running. Tony was pulling all his shields into place and making sure they'd never fall down again.

"You know how Nat helped me after we sent Loki and Thor back?" Clint asked, Tony shook his head, shields faltering for a moment. "She pounded me into a pulp and then helped me bedazzle Fury's eyepatch. She told me that if I let Loki get to me and haunt me for the rest of his life, I let Loki win. If you're half as smart as I think you are, you won't let that mutant beat you. We need you, Stark."

The other man relaxed and chugged whatever remained in his drink. Clint just watched him, tracing a finger over the edge of his own glass.

"Spray-paint," Tony said suddenly. "Pink spray paint. On the walls - all of them. Or we can make it festive. Then Fury can kill us both, and we won't have to think about it anymore."

Clint frowned. That certainly wasn't what he'd been aiming for. If he didn't know better, he'd say that Tony hadn't listened to a single word he'd said.

But then he caught it - he caught it through stolen memories and faint impressions. The slight curl of Tony's mouth, and the fact that he wasn't pouring himself another drink. Some how, he'd hit a nerve. The right nerve. The fact that he managed to do that showed that Tony had listened, that Tony had made a decision.

He'd get Nat to watch Tony. He knew she wouldn't mind it. They'd all watch him, until they were sure that he was going to be fine after all.

"You're on," Clint grinned, concealing the worry in his eyes. "If you hit Fury, it's twenty extra points. Thirty for Hill, forty for Nat."


End file.
